maximizer

This seems reasonable but I just don't think that it works in a world of human beings who are not perfectly rational value maximisers.

But what it is useful for is adding more evidence to the growing pile that suggests that humans are not rational utility maximisers, as presupposed by economists; and pointing out that unfairness makes people unhappy.

Rational choice theory views actors as rational insofar as they act instrumentally, are utility maximizers, possess stable and exogenous preferences, and are self-interested.